Postage Stamp

A postage stamp is proof of pre-paying a fee for postal services. Usually a small paper rectangle which is attached to an cover, signifying that the person sending the letter or package has paid for delivery, it is the most popular option to using a prepaid-postage envelope.

History

In it he argued that it would be well again for the sender to pay the cost of delivery, rather than the receiver who could refuse the letter if they could not or did not want to pay, as occasionally happened at the time. He also argued for a uniform rate of one penny per letter, no matter where its destination. Accounting costs for the government would thus be cut; postage would no longer be charged according to how far a letter had traveled, which required each letter to have an individual entry in the Royal Mail's accounts. Chalmers' ideas were finally adopted by Parliament in August, 1839 and the General Post Office launched the Penny Post service the next year in 1840 with two prepaid-postage symbolic envelopes or wrappers: one valued at a penny and one valued at two pence.

Three months later on the first prepaid-postage stamp, known as the Penny Black was issued with the profile of Queen Victoria printed on it. Because the United Kingdom issued the first stamps, the Universal Postal Union grants it an exemption from its rule that the recognition of the issuing country must appear on a stamp in Roman script for use in international mails. Before joining the U.P.U. many countries did not do this; there are very few violations of the rule since this time, though one example is the U.S. Pilgrim Tercentenary series, on which the country designation was inadvertently excluded. Because of this the numerous early issues of China and Japan often confound new collectors unfamiliar with Oriental scripts. A stamp must also show a face value in the issuing country's currency. Some countries have issued stamps with a letter of the alphabet or designation such as "First class" for a face value. Because of the U.P.U. rules their use is restricted to domestic mail, but breach of this rule is often tolerated. Exceptions to this are the British "E" stamp and the South African "International Letter Rate" stamp.

American Robin

The American Robin is a migratory songbird of the thrush family.
The American Robin is 25-28 cm (10-11 in) long. It has gray upperparts and head, and orange underparts, typically brighter in the male; the similarity between this coloring and that of the smaller and unrelated European Robin led to its common name. There are seven races, but only T . m. confinus in the southwest is mainly distinctive, with pale gray-brown underparts
During the breeding season, the adult males grow distinctive black feathers on their heads; after the breeding season they lose this eye-catching plumage.
This bird breeds all through Canada and the United States. While Robins infrequently overwinter in the northern part of the United States and southern Canada, most winter in the southern parts of the breeding range and beyond, from the southern USA to Guatemala. Most depart south by the end of August and begin to return north in March. This species is a very rare vagrant to western Europe. In autumn 2003, migration was displaced eastwards leading to massive movements through the eastern USA. most probably this is what led to no less than three American Robins being found in Great Britain, with two attempting to overwinter in 2003-4, one eventually being taken by a Sparrowhawk

Poinsettia

The poinsettia, also identified as the Mexican flame leaf or Christmas star (Euphorbia pulcherrima), is a plant known for its striking red displays at Christmas time. It is often used as a floral Christmas decoration because of its festive colours.
The "flowers" are in fact large bunches of coloured leaves (modified bracts); the flowers themselves are in the center of each leaf bunch, but rather small and inconspicuous. Cultivars have been formed with orange, pale green, cream and marbled leaves. It is necessary that the plant receives no light at night between approximately October and Christmas. The slightest exposure to light during this critical period will often prevent "flowering".
Poinsettias are native to southern Mexico and Central America, where they may reach heights of sixteen feet. They are named after Joel Roberts Poinsett, the first United States ambassador to Mexico, who introduced the plant in the U.S. in 1825.

Radio

Radio is the wireless transmission of signals, by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of light.
Radio waves.Radio waves are a form of electromagnetic radiation, formed whenever a charged object accelerates by a frequency that lies in the radio frequency (RF) portion of the electromagnetic spectrum. This is the variety from a few tens of hertz to a few hundred gigahertz.Electromagnetic radio spectrum
Other types of electromagnetic radiation, with frequencies above the RF range are infrared, visible light, ultraviolet, X-rays and gamma rays. Since the energy of an individual photon of radio frequency is too low to remove an electron from an atom, radio waves are classified as non-ionizing radiation.Radio transmission diagram and electromagnetic waves.Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space equally well, and does not need a medium of transport induces an alternating current and voltage in the conductor. This can be transformed into audio or other signals that carry information. Although the word 'radio' is used to explain this phenomenon, the transmissions which we know as television, radio, radar, and cell phone are all classed as radio frequency emissions.

Videophone

A videophone is a telephone which is able of both audio and video duplex transmission.AT&T conducted experiments and demonstrations of a "Picturephone" product and service in the early 1960s. Among the first manufacturers of commercially viable videophones was Toshiba.
Videotelephony is mostly used in large corporate setups, and are supported by systems such as Cisco CallManager. Other companies such as Tandberg, Radvision, and Polycom also offer similar solutions. Videoconferencing has usually been limited to the h.323 protocol (notably Cisco's SCCP implementation is an exception), however recently a shift towards SIP implementations is seen. In accordance with the adoption of SIP telephony for home users, videotelephony is also slowly becoming available to home users.Another protocol using videophones is H.324; this allows videophones to work in regular phone lines, since the bandwidth is limited by the phone line. The quality is about fifteen Frames per second. This type of videophone is generally used because of the affordable price.

Sugarcane

Sugarcane or Sugar cane (Saccharum) is a type of between 6–37 species of tall grasses (family Poaceae, tribe Andropogoneae), native to warm temperate to tropical regions of the Old World. They have stout, jointed fibrous stalks 2–6 m tall and sap rich in sugar. All the species interbreed, and the major commercial cultivars are complex hybrids.
Saccharum officinarum grown in Hawaii. There are 13 million hectares (32 million acres) of sugar cane plantations worldwide, with over 100 countries growing the crop. The top twenty producing countries harvested 1200 million metric tons of sugar cane in 2002 (more than 6 times the amount of sugar beet produced). The largest producers are Brazil, India, and China.
Raw sugar has a yellow to brown color. If a white product is preferred, sulfur dioxide may be bubbled through the cane juice prior to evaporation. This bleaches many color-forming impurities into colorless ones. Sugar bleached white by this sulfitation process is called mill white, plantation white or crystal sugar. This form of sugar is the most usually consumed form of sugar in sugarcane-producing countries.